


Night Terrors

by joyfulsongbird



Category: Hadestown - Mitchell
Genre: F/M, nightmare fic, they love each other lot ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-25 14:49:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21358003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joyfulsongbird/pseuds/joyfulsongbird
Summary: Orpheus has a nightmare about turning back, his fear becomes even more apparent when he is asleep, scaring Eurydice awake into seeing the effect Hadestown has left on her husband.
Relationships: Eurydice/Orpheus (Hadestown)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 57





	Night Terrors

He’s always been a heavy sleeper, ever since he was a little kid, he slept through thunderstorms, and since he always slept above the bar with Hermes, he could hear the dancing and pounding below him on late nights. He learned to sleep through it, to listen to the natural surroundings and help those lull him to sleep.

Now, his heavy sleeping is like a curse. It forces him to stay in these night terrors. These terrible dreams that trapped him in a dark tunnel all the way under the ground, walking endlessly towards a light he’ll never reach. Straining to listen for a voice, for a whisper, even just the echoing of footsteps that aren’t his. But there’s nothing, not a sign, he can’t hear her following him… maybe she’s not following him.

The thought hadn’t occurred to him up until that moment. She has to be following him right? They made promises. She told him before he let go of her hand and turned to face the darkness, that she was coming.

But Hades, what if he was holding her back? What if Eurydice was still in Hadestown and everyone laughed and scorned him as he left alone? He was to become martyr, that was it, wasn’t it? Hades wanted to make a fool of Orpheus so that there would never be another spark of hope in the darkness of Hadestown. Orpheus was the spark and Hades licked his thumb and was trying to extinguish him. And he would leave, and finally turn around in the daylight to find an empty space, empty darkness, where his lover should be. It must be a trick, it’s trap, that’s what it is.

He can’t sing his song anymore, his throat closes up so tightly that it feels as if there’s a knot where his Adam’s apple should be. His one protection, his song, can no longer be used. The darkness presses closer and there is nothing but his own thoughts to listen to.

Who am I?

Why would she follow me into the cold and darkness when she has warmth and work back there?

Why would he let her go?

Where is she?

Who am I against him?

Why would he let me win?

Is this trick?

It must be a trick.

Worries bubbled up, all the way up to the very top of his head and then-

Orpheus

She’s right there, before him, staring at him. There are no words to describe this look that she gives him, it morphs and changes in the few moments he gets a good look at her face. Shock, horror, sadness, forgiveness.

She’s gone before he can stutter out a thing to say in response to her whisper of his name. He can’t even say her name once more in her presence. Now, whenever he says her name, he will think of as an unfinished answer to a question never asked. That he never completed the last thing she asked of him to do.

He’s dropped to his knees, the world around him growing heavy, heavier with each growing second. He wants to follow her, wants to go back, at any cost. He doesn’t deserve a world that will forgive him, he deserves to be punished for a deed as terrible as this. He cursed her to a life of labor, of never ending smog and brick and walls. It should be him, it should be him, it should be him going back in her place.

All he can do, though, is the let world crash in on him. This is all he can do, is let the universe invert on him. Colors become gray, sun becomes dull, spring becomes winter. This is not what he was promised when he received his song, this is not what he hoped for when he dreamed of a world that was better. Is this better? If this is better then he doesn’t want-

“Orpheus.”

Her voice is back.

“Orpheus!”

It’s loud, striking, alive.

“ORPHEUS!”

He can’t breath, he can’t see, but he can hear. Her choked half sobs, half formed words are what drives him to open his eyes to the world. Convinced that the women he finds crying will be Eurydice down on her knees, going back to that place right in front of him. But instead, he finds the small women gripping a pillow in her lap, a few tears dripping from her chin but the sobs are mostly dry. He’s never really seen her angry cry like this, the kind of crying that is forced out of your body against your will. The one that comes after a high of emotion, any emotion.

“Why-?” he cuts himself off before he can finish the question, first taking in his surroundings.

They are home.

The pillow she grips is theirs.

The bed he lies on is the one they share.

“Why are you crying?” he finally ventures.

“Why am I crying?” she demands, throwing the pillow back at him. “Why are- what even- gods, Orpheus…”

she moves to sit closer to him, he draws away for a moment, confused. “What’s going on?”

she bites her bottom lip. Somewhere in her eyes, there is deep fear of some sort. A wariness lying there, dormant for now, but she’s not sure what to expect.

“You were… crying out in your sleep. And I woke up and you- you were… you sounded so broken and I didn’t know what to do-”

“hey,” he draws her closer, she settles to rest her head against his shoulder, taking a deep, chesty breath to calm herself. “everything’s okay.”

“don’t lie to me, Orpheus.” she spits out. “don’t say everything’s okay when everything’s obviously not okay. You have tears in your eyes too, you know. You’re trembling too, I can feel it, right here.” she places a hand on his bare chest, over his heart. Where his chest is ablaze, like he’s just run ten miles. “And your heartbeat… please, love, tell me what’s wrong.”

He tugs her closer, to be able to cradle her in his lap and wipe away her tears before telling her that he dreamed of the worst possible outcome of their journey.

“I dreamed I lost you.” is his answer, finally, when he plucks up the courage. Even that short sentence makes his eyes burn, he squeezes them shut as if that will make the tears go away but it does the opposite. He feels them slip down his cheeks like raindrops sliding down their glass windows. “I dreamed that I failed.”

It’s her turn to comfort, to kiss away tears. He feels her thumb brush a tear from under his eye before it can even fall, and press a soft kiss to that same spot.

“we’re here, together.” she murmurs. “I am right here with you, don’t ever forget that.”

“But I nearly did, I doubted, I almost turned countless times.” he turns his head, ashamed for even admitting the thought had ever crossed his mind.

“and you know what?” she asks, now smoothing his hair, tucking loose strands behind his ear. “I would still love you even if you did, I would have forgiven you, even if the worst had come about. And I’d have gone to Hades and said to him ‘one day, you’ll have to send me up or him down’ and one day, that would have come true.”

“I would wait for you.” he says, wiping his nose with the back of his hand.

“so would I. Always.”

She leans back and moves so that Orpheus’ head settled at the crook of her neck, there almost as a comfort to both of them. Pressed so close together, so that it is impossible to even propose that they’re imagining each other.

“I used to get nightmares, remember?” she murmurs into the night.

“yes,” he answers. “bad ones, at first. But they got better, over time… how?”

“You.” she answers. “you stayed with me when I couldn’t sleep, held me when I was afraid, wiped away my tears when I cried.”

“that’s all I need.” Orpheus breathed. “Just like now.”

she nods. “just like now.”

There came about a long pause, where they both just breath and wait for the other to speak, and slowly Orpheus starts to drift off again. He snaps his eyes open one more time, so he can say one more thing before succumbing to the risk of sleep.

“Eurydice?”

“yes, love?” she hums sleepily.

“I’ve got a new idea for a song.”

“yeah?”

“yeah.” he says succinctly. “It’s going to be about whispers and moonlight and tears. But it has a happy ending.”

“Like our ending?”

“yeah,” he smiles. “Like our ending.”

And then he’s asleep.

No more nightmares that night.


End file.
